So much for history.  Tradition has transformed Twardowsky into a gay and brilliant gentleman, who, in order to gain all the pleasures of life, sold his soul to the devil, engaging on his honor to give it up to him whenever he (the devil) should enter the city of Rome.  Twardowsky now enjoyed to the full his new power, reveling in luxury himself, and lavishing gifts and banquets on his friends.  The populace also shared his generosity—­all the more, too, from the strange manner of it.  On one occasion, we are told, he pierced three holes in a shoemaker’s nose with his own awl, and caused a tun of brandy to flow from it for the refreshment of the crowd.  One day he was informed that a stranger who was at the inn called the “City of Rome” wished to see him.  He went at once to the place with no misgivings, but on his arrival there found the devil, who had come to claim the fulfillment of the contract.  Provoked at the quibble, he resolved to employ a ruse himself, and just as the devil was about to take possession of him he seized the infant child of the innkeeper from its cradle and held it up before him, its innocence being a sure defence against Satan’s power.  He, however, demanded what had become of his plighted word.  The honor of the Polish gentleman could not resist this appeal.  He put down the child and rose into the air with Satan.  But while they were still hovering over Cracow the sound of church-bells awoke in Twardowsky’s recollection a hymn to the Virgin, which he forthwith sang, and the devil could hold him no longer.  Twardowsky, however, could not get down again, but remains suspended in the air, only receiving news from the earth by means of a spider which happened to be on the tail of his coat, and which occasionally spins a thread and goes down, for a while, returning with whatever it may have picked up for his information and amusement.

No Polish story would be complete without a woman, and so we find that Twardowsky had a wife, beautiful, witty and imperious, with all the fascinations universally conceded to the Polish women.  Madame Twardowsky is said to have ruled her husband just as he ruled the devil during the time of that personage’s subjection; and there is a second version of the story which makes her too much for Satan himself.  According to this account, Twardowsky was entertaining a number of friends at the “City of Rome,” when suddenly the devil appeared.  While Twardowsky, to gain time, was reading over the compact, his wife, looking over his shoulder, suddenly laughed, and addressing the devil, told him there were still three conditions for him to fulfill, on failure of which the parchment should be torn up, and asked whether she might impose them.  The devil politely replied in the affirmative.  “Here, then,” said she, “see this horse painted on the wall of the inn:  I wish to mount him, and you must make me a whip of sand and a staple of walnuts.”  The devil bowed, and in a moment the horse was prancing before their